Nathan, Michele and Enzo generously agreed to let us take their campervan to Europe so we flew to London to pick it up. We had 2 nights in London and used the time to catch up on sleep, washing and Formula1. We also fitted in a very British activity – “Proms in the Park” at Battersea Gardens, performed by the Royal Philharmonic Concert Orchestra (RPCO). It had rained pretty hard overnight and all morning but the organisers were sure that the forecasted sunshine would come through so pushed on with the event. We arrived at Battersea Park in the late afternoon, just as the sun came out.
As we were in the picnic section, the guy where we were staying had given us a huge piece of plastic drop sheet to lay on the ground – how glad we were to be able to wrap ourselves in that plastic about an hour later when it absolutely POURED down, just as the supporting act was starting…and continued until the end of their act!
Despite some very soggy picnic blankets and some very soggy backsides, the atmosphere was lovely, and it was such a joy when the sun came out again. There was time between the supporting act and the RPCO for everyone to shake off, wring out their blankets and refill their glasses. WOW! What an evening! The orchestra was incredible! They played lots of songs the kids knew (three songs from the Nutcracker, Star Wars, Chariots of Fire, Flight of the Bumblebee, Peter and the Wolf…) plus lots of others (Time to Say Goodbye, That’s Amore…) and there were three wonderful singers. They had us all up dancing and had the William Tell Overture Finale and fireworks to finish off the night. So much fun and we all loved it!
Nathan and Enzo arrived in London on Sunday morning – the kids were really thrilled to see them again, even for just a short time. We’d bought the cheapest Le Shuttle train to France that we could book (at 00:18 that night) but we drove straight to Folkestone with the hope of being put on an earlier train – and were stoked to get one 7 hours earlier. Arriving in Calais, Park4Night was in immediate use with a pretty spot outside a small village.
The next 8 weeks have a very loose plan with nothing booked and only a brief outline of where we are going. The joy of that is the flexibility to linger or bust (whilst being very mindful of not running out of days at the end) but does require planning time each couple of days. As Logan will be doing all the driving (due to insurance), I’m chief navigator – made easy by us all enjoying similar things (as long as the word “swimming” comes up every few days, the kids are happy to do anything). We have a very tight budget but thankfully a lot of our favourite things are free!
You’ll have noticed that we haven’t visited a lot of museums on this trip. Whilst we know that museums are amazing, they’re just not really our thing in large quantities. Some people don’t like hiking, some people don’t like sleeping in tents, some people skip museums. That being said, we’re obviously extremely passionate about educating our kids (and ourselves), so we spent the next 2 days immersed in the Battle of the Somme.
We started off with a YouTube video, which Zara found pretty confronting. We decided on 7 sights to visit that, in our opinion, told the story of the initial excitement of the soldiers travelling overseas with their mates, the reality and atrocities of war, the (what must have felt like) endless battles for small gains of land, the camaraderie, the unimaginable losses, the rows and rows and rows of unknown soldiers in the cemeteries, and the thousands and thousands and thousands of names on the memorials of sons, brothers, fathers, uncles, nephews, husbands, fiancés, boyfriends, buddies, and workmates lost on the battlefield with no known grave.
As challenging as it was to spend time here, hearing Zara murmur “thank you” as she wandered slowly past the headstones reassured us that it was the right thing to do. Ultimately, we were taken by the words of the Lochnagar Crater Foundation: We, as individuals, can’t bring peace between nations, but together we can still bring a little more peace into our own lives, and into the lives of those around us. In their honour.
Our next stop was Dijon:
From there we took a variety of pricey-but-efficient toll roads and narrow, winding back roads through cute villages, roadside lavender stalls and fields of sunflowers of the Jura mountains. It was a lovely mix of chilling, swimming, hiking and enjoying the end of the French summer.
Lac de Chalain:
Hiking at Lac de Bonlieu & Moulin de la Fraite:
Our last major stop was at Gorges du Verdon in the Provence-Alpes-Côte d’Azur region of southern France. It was absolutely stunning! The water colour was almost unreal! We hired a peddle boat for an hour to go further up the gorge as the cliffs are too steep to walk along. The gorge was full of peddle boats, paddle boards, electric boats and kayaks – normally I might be annoyed by the busyness but it was such a lovely atmosphere. The water was very, very deep but so delightful to swim in. We spent a quiet wild camping night high up in the gorge so could see the river without any boat traffic early in the morning as the sun rose – so very pretty!
After we returned the peddle boat to Lac de Sainte-Croix, we found a wonderful place to swim where our crazy kids could leap off ever-higher rocks!
Our next stop was Monaco. Monaco was exactly as Lucas had imagined it would be and he loved it! The knowledge that both Logan and Lucas have about makes and models of cars absolutely astounds me and I totally underestimated how many hours Lucas could spend car-watching.
A highlight was sitting at the Fairmont Hairpin (part of the Monaco Formula1 Grand Prix circuit) watching the absolute joy on Lucas’s face as he anticipated and then videoed every Porsche, Ferrari, Lamborghini, Bentley, McLaren driving around the hairpin – “Mum, it’s like a waterhole but instead of rhinos and elephants, it’s Porsche and McLaren!”
We parked the campervan outside of Monaco and walked down and back up (so many stairs!) each day…but as we were leaving, to the kids’ total excitement, Logan drove into Monaco and took the campervan around the hairpin!
The next 6-ish weeks will be in Italy, Slovenia and Croatia and we are excited about the adventure ahead.
I love that everyone is getting to experience the different things they enjoy! I guess that’s the great thing about having more time you can ‘absorb’ more ❤️
That’s so cool guys!
( If I were to see those cars I would of identified them as, black car, grey car, small black car………)